Devotional

An Altar in the World, Meditation #5

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On recommendation, I recently read An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor. It’s subtitled A Geography of Faith. In the spirit of that lane, rather than offer a review I’ve selected my top highlights and will offer a meditation post for each one. Here’s quote #5:

To become fully human means growing gentler toward human weakness. It means practicing forgiveness of my and everyone else’s hourly failures to live up to divine standards.

Chapter 7, The Practice of Living with Purpose

What Taylor is describing in the paragraph containing this quote is her view of loving God and neighbor as oneself. She calls that the vocation of becoming fully human. These thoughts are two of the six she offers to explain what she means. They are all examples of living with purpose.

What if we all were working toward growing more gentle?

What if we all were empathetic toward other’s weaknesses?

What if we all were forgiving toward failures, including our own?

What if we all were after the glory of God?

What if we all were becoming fully human?

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An Altar in the World, Meditation #4

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On recommendation, I recently read An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor. It’s subtitled A Geography of Faith. In the spirit of that lane, rather than offer a review I’ve selected my top highlights and will offer a meditation post for each one. Here’s quote #4:

Our bodies remain God’s best way of getting to us.

Chapter 3, The Practice of Wearing Skin

One might argue there are other ways just as impactful that God gets to us, but Taylor makes an interesting point. Whether through our body loathing, our seasons of suffering, or our comparing our bodies to our neighbor’s, we certainly have many opportunities for more of God.

I believe a good chunk of these opportunities revolve around the work of acceptance. Accepting the diagnosis, the loss, the genes, the future produces humility, alignment, focus, and peace that may only come through the avenue of our bodies.

I’ve had few physical challenges in my 55 years of life. The main one I’ve dealt with in recent years is a Schatzki’s Ring. If that’s a new term to you, you’re not alone. Bottom line: I have to be careful and alert to food getting stuck in my esophagus.

It’s more annoying than anything, but it has caused me to attune to myself and others in ways I hadn’t before. It all started in a Miami restaurant in 2014 when I had no idea what was going all. All I knew was my chest was tightening, and everything I had eaten wasn’t going to stay in my body. Since then this has happened in friend’s homes, multiple restaurants, even on stage this past Sunday. That was weird. Try singing with a wedged orange slice on the verge of shooting out of your mouth-a whole new method of God getting your attention.

I’ve learned many lessons from these situations. I believe the key one is the value of lowering our guards. Here are three lived examples of what I mean:

  • Lower your guard rather than hiding behind any sense of embarrassment or shame when you have to excuse yourself from the table.
  • Lower your guard rather than exploding in anger or pride when you have to seek help for something you can’t explain or fix.
  • Lower your guard rather than ignoring the obvious and making matters worse for you and those in your company.

How does that connect to God getting to me through my body, in this case a Schatzki Ring?

  • My guard hinders his releasing my shame.
  • My guard halts his providing my desperately needed healing.
  • My guard eliminates his growing and maturing me and therefore my community.

May we pray, “God, even in my body, get to me however you want. I’m all yours.”

An Altar in the World, Meditation #3

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On recommendation, I recently read An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor. It’s subtitled A Geography of Faith. In the spirit of that lane, rather than offer a review I’ve selected my top highlights and will offer a meditation post for each one. Here’s quote #3:

How often we are embarrassed to do and say the things that really affect us.

Chapter 12, The Practice of Pronouncing Blessings

This one is a pickle. It is a What If-er’s nightmare. “If I say how I’m really feeling, how will they respond?” “If I make this decision, will my friends understand?” On and on.

Taylor advocates for two things in this chapter: 1) embrace blessing all things and 2) speak from your heart.

The first time I gave an unexpected, heartfelt blessing was in a letter to my college best friend and his fiancee. I was surprised how much it touched them. From that I learned we don’t practice blessing enough. It’s a foreign language.

To improve our skills, as simple as it sounds, it all begins with the word “may”. “May” frames the future, a future where potential is realized and hopes are fulfilled. When introducing a spiritual blessing, “may” invites the work and hand of God with reverence and promise. No matter the person, no matter the present, everyone could stand to hear a blessing, a word to affect today and tomorrow.

To the newborn, speak a blessing.

To the estranged, speak a blessing.

To the groundbreakers, speak a blessing.

To the paralyzed, speak a blessing.

To the faithful, speak a blessing.

To the wanderer, speak a blessing.

To the one in the mirror, speak a blessing.

To the One above all others, speak a blessing.

Photo by Glen Carrie on Unsplash

An Altar in the World, Meditation #2

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On recommendation, I recently read An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor. It’s subtitled A Geography of Faith. In the spirit of that lane, rather than offer a review I’ve selected my top highlights and will offer a meditation post for each one. Here’s quote #2:

Human beings may separate things into as many piles as we wish-separating spirit from flesh, sacred from secular, church from world. But we should not be surprised when God does not recognize the distinctions we make between the two.

Chapter 1, The Practice of Waking Up to God

Taylor’s quote comes at the end of the chapter where she has offered the teaching that God can show up in any space or through any means he chooses. In that moment, we have the opportunity to erect an altar-take note and mark that spot where God revealed himself. Her biblical example is Jacob’s reaction to the ladder dream. Because he knew he had encountered God, he paused and created a marker of significance.

Makes me think of Paul David Tripp’s teaching about two-drawer living. God doesn’t instruct us to live two separate lives-one for him and one for ourselves. Everything belongs in one drawer. The challenge is to view more and more of life as an encounter with him, a journey with him, an alertness that he’s always here.

Case in point: Sunday after church I had three hours to kill before attending an event in another town. I decided to google a new place to eat, try something different. I ended up at Blu’ Island Bistro. When I pulled in the parking lot, I wasn’t quite sure. But I said to myself, “Trust the reviews.”

It’s not a big place, but it has charm. I immediately felt it when I walked through the door. And here’s the thing: IT NEVER STOPPED.

Besides the quick seating, the perfect plate portion, the excellent tacos, and almost just right sweet tea, no one, and I mean no one, lacked joy. Not a customer. Not an employee. Everyone seemed happy to be there. I literally said to myself, “I should tell my pastor that I found the restaurant that feels like church.”

I stopped counting how many servers checked on me. I believe it was six. That’s a little crazy. And I don’t mean annoying crazy. I mean “thank you for your care” crazy.

I didn’t just encounter God between 10:00 and 11:00AM Sunday morning. I encountered him at the restaurant, then at the beach, then at the ice cream shop, and then at the event. How? I was looking for him. And the altar I erected? I gave the restaurant a Google review, I’m posting this blog, and I thanked God for putting everything in one pile.

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An Altar in the World, Meditation #1

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On recommendation, I recently read An Altar in the World by Barbara Brown Taylor. It’s subtitled A Geography of Faith. In the spirit of that lane, rather than offer a review I’ve selected my top highlights and will offer a meditation post for each one. Here’s quote #1:

Faith sometimes looks like a blunt refusal to stop speaking into the divine silence.

Chapter 10, The Practice of Feeling Pain

In the face of betrayal, keep speaking.

In the face of confusion, keep speaking.

In the face of loss, keep speaking.

When fear says, “No one cares,” refuse to listen.

When doubt says, “No one’s listening,” refuse to isolate.

When impatience says, “No one’s responding,” refuse to self-muzzle.

There is a time to be blunt.

There is a time to be persistent.

There is a time to be verbose.

If God is silent, might it be because he wants to keep hearing from you?

If God is silent, might it be because he’s respecting your need to process?

If God is silent, might it be because he’s taking a moment to appreciate your faith?

Photo by Harli Marten on Unsplash

8 “Give Me’s” for Waiting

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4AM. Not my preferred alarm setting. But you do what you got to do.

I decided what I had to this morning in order to start this day right was to get in a run before having to be in my car by 6:15. After my run around 5:15 while stretching, I found myself taking a longer than usual time to spend some time praying. Very unexpectedly, I got an answer for a prayer I’ve been in for several months, actually most of this year. Maybe that story will come later; but for now, I’m focused on the reality that some prayer answers are a long time coming. That means a lot of waiting.

So it shouldn’t have surprised me that on the same day this answer came an email came to my inbox this afternoon with a prayer entitled “Prayer for the Waiting Time.” It not only was timely, but also affirming.

If you find yourself in waiting time, take your time to read through this prayer by Nicola Slee. These eight requests may be the support you need to carry on, to wait well, and to keep listening.

Give me the resolution to say ‘no’ to the good so that I will be ready to say ‘yes’ to the better.

Give me the courage to keep living in the open-endedness of the future without foreclosing the mysterious work of your Spirit in my haste or fear.

Give me the persistence to stay in the wilderness of unknowing until I am ready to receive your call.

Give me the strength to keep still and keep waiting when all about me is pushing towards movement and activity and choice.

Give me the acceptance to live these days in uneventfulness, simplicity and hiddenness, without craving excitement, distraction, or change.

Give me the grace to live in the emptiness of ‘not doing,’ without the rewards of achievement, fulfillment, or success.

Give me the wisdom to discriminate between my own impatience to move forward and your Spirit’s deep stirring of my spirit when the time is right to move.

Give me the faith to trust in your obscurity, the obedience to stay faithful to your mystery, the courage to keep trust with your inscrutability.

Photo by Şahin Sezer Dinçer on Unsplash

The Value of Tears

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The latest YouVersion reading plan I’m in addresses bitterness. Day 3 of the plan ended with this question:

How can failing to shed bitter tears result in sinful bitterness of heart and life?

Overcoming Bitterness, by Stephen Viars

Can’t say I’ve ever made the connection between not shedding tears and bitterness. Before answering the question, I rephrased the question into a statement:

Failing to shed bitter tears results in sinful bitterness of heart and life.

Viars revisited the stories of David, Mordecai, and Peter to illustrate his thought. When I considered situations from the past that I may still have bitterness about, I wondered, “Maybe I haven’t sufficiently shed tears about them. Now, it seems unnecessary. Yet, it’s worth the encouragement to acknowledge how tears could have served in the past and the value of embracing them in the future to eliminate bitterness growing.”

By the way, to answer his question I flipped it to list three ways tears help us:

  • Tears help us fully grieve.
  • Tears help us find clarity.
  • Tears help us face weakness and sin.

What’s your answer? How do tears help you?

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Whose Voice Matters Most

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It’s Labor Day weekend here in the U.S. May mean you have more time to think. Here’s a reminder for you: Who God Says You are Matters Most.

In my thinking time already, I reviewed three conversations this week where descriptions were painted about someone. All were offered in constructive ways. Regardless of the intention or the relationship, human evaluations are limited. That’s not the case with God. Here are three reasons why:

Time known…God’s known you from conception…No one’s known you longer. Someone we knew in college may not recognize us today. It’s like that statement some middle-age adults make to a current friend: “If we’d known each other in college, we probably wouldn’t have been friends.” God’s been around for all the years. That history gives him the most information to back up what he says about you.

Depth known…God’s known you from formation…No one’s known you as deeply. The revelations we get from personality assessments make us say, “How did they know that? That’s so accurate.” It was no surprise to God. He wired you. He’s also been part of the ins and outs of life that have continued to form you, to mature you, to change you to the core. He knows you the most deeply, so his words about you carry the most weight.

Relationally known…God knows you by connection…No one’s more connected. Some people wear many hats in our relationship with them (family, boss, friend, neighbor, coworker, etc.). Naturally, we want to lean in to what they say. We long to be known by them. But there are many hats that only God can wear. When we are aware of them all, respect them, honor them, give thanks for them, the magnitude of what he says about us expands. Often, we forget just how much we most want to be known by him, but he cannot know us any more.

During this weekend, find some time to give him space to speak. Tune in to his voice. It matters most.

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10 Endurance Tests

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Currently I’m going through a YouVersion reading plan for James 1. The first four days of ten have pretty much focused on this verse:

For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow.

James 1:3 NLT

Reading this the other day, it struck me to get specific. For instance, when faith in one area of life is tested it has a chance to grow. To flesh that out, here are ten additions where growth can be experienced by faith testing.

When your faith in your spouse is tested, your endurance as a vow-keeping partner has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your boss is tested, your endurance as a loyal employee has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your children is tested, your endurance as a loving parent has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your parents is tested, your endurance as an honoring child has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your government is tested, your endurance as a contributing citizen has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your company is tested, your endurance as a committed team player has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your church is tested, your endurance as a kingdom-minded citizen has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your investments is tested, your endurance as a focused treasurer has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your friend is tested, your endurance as a reliable presence has a chance to grow.

When your faith in your God is tested, your endurance as an image bearer has a chance to grow.

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Sacred Space

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What is it about 3AM? God seems to enjoy waking me up from some whopper of a dream around this time, and off my mind goes. And my first thought is, “You know I’m trying to sleep here, right?”

This morning’s dream was fuzzy, but not. The main storyline was that a man had been told he had 24 hours to live. He wasn’t lying in a hospital bed. He hadn’t been in a tragic accident. Somehow he knew this was true, and he was working through letting everyone know.

He was sitting on a chair in the center of a room. People were coming and going from the room. It had the feeling of a wake, but the person wasn’t in a coffin. He was alive, still available for visitors to say, show, do whatever they wanted in the time they had.

And that’s the observation I had just made when I woke up. No one was rushed. Time seemed to not matter while it also ticked away. As he continued to contact people to share his news, people arrived to visit and say goodbye. But no one was panicked or hurried. The mood in the room was peaceful, almost sacred.

There could be many takeaways from this scene. The one that stood out to me at 3AM was the preciousness of space. It’s a gift when we receive it. It’s a gift when others protect it for us. It’s a gift that God offers to us probably more often than we think. It’s certainly a gift when we live in peace, without panic or hurry.

May we honor our spaces. May we recognize the sacred and sit in it as long as possible.

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